I thought I would give a look into my process for one of my layouts. I’ve seen great examples of scrapbookers doing this. Nichol Magouirk is starting a weekly feature of her start to finish process, Marcy Penner did a post about the anatomy of one of her layouts, and most recently Christine Middlecamp just posted about her process. I thought each entry was so interesting; I liked seeing what motivated each scrapbooker and how their layout went from concept to completion. So here is my thought process on this layout.
I realized tonight looking at this in low light that a digital scrapbooker could probably do this pretty quickly all digital, but I don’t really work that way. I was thinking more in terms of layering paper elements. I pulled out a bunch of supplies and a picture of Tuesday talking.
I almost always start with a kraft or white piece of cardstock so I can easily visualize the whole layout space. I started moving things around and opened up the Silhouette Studio software to type in the words I wanted to cut.
I find this software (that is free, you can download it even without a machine if you like. I did before I ordered mine to see how I liked it) easy to use. I like that you can put everything on the page that you want to cut, but only choose a few things to cut at once (that’s what I’m showing above). That makes it easy to choose to cut a few things in one color and a few things in another. The font I used is Frutiger LT Std. I had to buy it for my logo so I thought I’d utilize it for scrapbooking as well. I also used Amelie for “talks” I would have liked to find something closer to the ki tuesday sticker I like so much, but it works.
I started cutting out of cardstock, but knew I was going to use vinyl as well. I got a great deal at Expressions Vinyl. I think I used a 20% off coupon and got a whole bunch of colors, and transfer tape, which is necessary and I’ll explain more about later. Cutting vinyl means no carrier sheet (like you can see in the first photo) is necessary. It cuts so precisely even the smallest shape can be cut. A woman in the Silhouette Yahoo group makes her own nail decals!
I decided to mist the background so it wasn’t so stark. I have multiple sheets of this cardstock so I decided to leave words I had cut on a plain one and slowly move them over. I do this a lot.
You can see at this point I’ve stuck some things down (and had a little mishap. The p on “help me” got torn by the transfer tape. Luckily with the Silhouette it’s easy to cut another letter, even out of a scrap of paper). The cardstock/patterned paper letters just with glue, the vinyl is self adhesive so it’s easy to stick down. Except if you don’t use transfer tape it can be hard to get the spacing right.
Using transfer tape is easy. After cutting the vinyl I trim off the section that was cut. Then you have to “weed” it. The outside vinyl comes off really easily and I use a paper piercer to get the middle of letters off. Next peel the backing off the transfer tape and put the sticky side on to the word. After using a small scraper the tape should pull up with the letters stuck to it. Position this where you would like it rub it down (with the scraper around the letters, but not too hard, as I found out because it can rip paper) and then slowly pull back the tape.
I added stitching under the photo (this combo of elements was left over from another project) and a label with journaling.
Done! She has been learning words crazy fast and I can’t keep track of them any more. I’m really happy that I have this snapshot of her vocabulary at two. I’m make a few notes on the back about what some of the things mean (B is cold/blanket, crackie is cracker, Mom is my mom, appie is apple).
Like I said before I’m sure you could do something like this digitally (and if you have done a word collage like this please link to it in the comments, I’d love to see an example!) or even with stamps. I personally love the different textures. This is the best photo I could get of the really sparkly acid green cardstock I used (the light was fading fast). You can see the difference between that and the vinyl that is very thin, and light colors a bit translucent. I can see myself using vinyl in place of stickers/other die cuts because it is so easy and precise. Next I’m going to experiment with cutting the same word multiple times and layering the vinyl. Using transfer tape it should be easy and it wouldn’t be as translucent.
Thank you for all the kind words about the site; I am so excited about it. Please remember to update your feeds, links and bookmarks. Thank you!
And… begin!
Hello! Miss me? Because I certainly missed blogging. I have been so focused on this; my new site. Things like this are always more work than they look to be, at least I think so. I figured branding, new site, business cards, PDFs, care guides, contracts, piece of cake! Well the jokes on me. I’ve had Sciarrino and Bj both working overtime helping me get my site live and I’m so excited to say yay, it’s here! I have to know what you, my loyal readers, think. I have about a week to do some tweaking before a big giveaway I have planned.
Since we last chatted Tuesday turned two! I still remember her birth like it was yesterday. And of course she still feels like a baby since SHE HARDLY EVER SLEEPS THROUGH THE NIGHT!
These photos are from a chilly day a few weeks ago. We went to the waterfront in the afternoon to try to get a family picture (I have a goal this year of one per month). Total failure on that front as the puffy vest I was wearing did nothing except make me look super pregnant (with Christmas cookies).
If you think Tuesday looks happy here (in the low light of the carousel) you should have seen her in Disneyland. Oh. My. Goodness. That girl loved it. Wants to talk/sign about it everyday. Of course she thinks we were in Hawaii since there were palm trees and she saw the ocean when we were landing. At the airport she ran up to a palm tree and exclaimed happily, “Hawaii!!!” I took minimal photos so I have to wait for relatives to send me their files to blog about it (hear that relatives?!?!). Oh yes, it was the big family adventure; ten of us.
So back to this new blog business. Let me tell you something. If you are contemplating starting a blog go get your own URL now. STAT! Bj laboriously downloaded and moved all my images and content from my Typepad blog because I was using a Typepad URL. I could not bare the thought of loosing almost six years of blogging and nearly had a breakdown when it looked like it might go that way. He totally came through for me. So why did I decide I needed a new site? Well it became clear to me pretty quickly that I did not want to keep up a photo blog and personal blog. So many photo blogs are so blah. I mean they are awesome at looking at beautiful photography but I miss the interaction with readers. I don’t have anything to hide about my personal life from my clients so I really don’t mind them coming to my mashup blog. I mean I go into their houses so come one, come see what’s up with me too, why not! Unfortunately Typepad didn’t have the functionality I needed to add pages and details that are necessary when people check out my services, so a move was necessary.
Take a look around and tell me really, honestly what you think. YOU are the ones I want to feel at home here. The menu at the top will help you get around. There is an about me page, details about my sessions, an easy way to contact me, a link to catagories and archives as well as my twitter, and a button to subscribe to the feed. You can also just put the URL into google reader if you like. I chose to do three posts on the home page so it would load a little quicker for all those wonderful mobile devices. Pictures can no longer be saved, but please if you would like one to use don’t hesitate to ask. With proper credit I will usually say yes. One thing I hope to change as soon as I can figure it out is the comments section. I loved threaded comments (so I could reply to a comment and the commenter would get email notification). That is not built into the WordPress Theme I got and I can’t figure out a way around it… yet. I will still respond to comments but you’ll have to come back to see what I’ve said. A bit lame I know. The footer (that grey box) houses my blogroll, what I’ve been reading (Amazon affiliate links), things I love (which I will continue to update), and a handy search feature.
This blog is not going to turn into a photography only blog. It’s going to be a mashup of everything I (and I hope you) love.
So, what do you think?
Top of 2010
Ok, I’m following in so many people’s footsteps on this posts I don’t even know who to link to. These are my favorite layouts of the year. If you don’t scrapbook and won’t be reading through the post a little announcement. I’m working on a pretty big (and exciting) project so I’m going to be signing off for the next two weeks. I’ll see you back here in the middle of the month!
I love this mostly because Tuesday helped me with it 🙂
I had this one hanging up for the longest time.
All those brads, all those flowers. That photo. Love it!
Love these photos and I’ve had the days of the week stickers for a long time. Always feels good to use a product you’ve been saving.
A scraplift that I had been wanting to try for a long time. I think I’m going to lift this simple layout again and again.
One of the first layouts in my new craft space from the beginning of the year.
First try with mist.
Hands down my favorite layout of the year. So glad when I put the real mushy stuff out there.
Fun to use scraps from the quilt on the layout.
Oh man; Tuesday and her sleep. I should do many more layouts about this. Luckily she has only woken up once tonight and I got her down so I could kiss my sweetie at midnight 🙂
Borrowing my step-mom’s cricut made me realize how bad I wanted a digital die cutter (and now I have one, yay!).
And of course my week in the life. I think I will forever be glad that I did this project.
Even if you memory keep in different ways doesn’t ever little thing you get down, every picture, make you so glad you took the time to do it? That’s how I feel. I love looking back on these memories, and of course creating new ones.
If you did a best of 2010 post will you link it in the comments so we can all be inspired?
See you in a few weeks!
Love these little things
Oh man you guys. Guess who got to stay up until FIVE AM this morning? Me! I know sometimes I really shouldn’t stay up working, but I was on a roll. If I’m on a roll with Quickbooks I make myself finish because I loath that part of my job so so much. I stayed up until one to finish. Only to get upstairs and realize that Bj had been rocking Tuesday for an hour already (and he had early morning calls). So I was with her (besides a 45 minute break—thank you papa!) until 5:03 when she finally caved. Needless to say I’m tired today.
There was a little sun (after snow and ran since this is Oregon) and I spent it organizing my cardstock stash. I decided I didn’t need to keep the 200 sheets or so of weird colors I had accumulated early in my scrapbooking antics when I bought sets instead of sheets (I de-stashed about 35 sheets of peach alone). Now that I have a daughter who will happily cut it up (with help), draw on it, or cover it in stickers I figured I could get it out of my stash and make it easier to pull the colors I love.
I took this photo after I finished (and was out of daylight) with my phone. Pure happiness for me. It’s tucked away and I hope I can dig into it again soon; after I finish up year end business stuff.
Isn’t it funny how little things like this can make you feel zen. Do you do anything like this (organizing something little and really unimportant compared to all the stuff you have to do)?
Scrapbooking and Shooting
Oh my those were some good family days. I love that most about the holidays, being together. My lovely friend was visiting from Vermont and I squeezed in a photo shoot for her on Christmas Eve morning. It was so dark and cloudy and yuck. But some creative furniture re-arranging and popping outside for a few minutes with her little man and I think (hope) you can see some of why I love Ceara.
More to come, no time for editing! I didn’t get to say a real goodbye because we were hoping to stop over again later in the day. It didn’t work out, but at least I saved myself some tears. Of course it helps that I have my loves around:
Okay enough with the mushy mushy. Sarah came over the day after Christmas so we could shop. Just kidding, we scrapped of course. Who wants to shop when you can eat leftovers (and chinese takeout) and play with paper and (automatic) glue (guns)?!?!
The love affair with my Silhouette continues. Did anyone get one under their tree? I cut the title and the journaling block (in two pieces) with the machine. The heart is a piece of wrapping paper and the other paper is Ki Memories.
I try to make a habit of scrapping pictures as I rotate them out of frames. I figure if I like them enough to put them up on the walls they should be immortalized in my albums. Besides awkward sizes, etc. What do you do with pictures you rotate out?
I think Bj is going to be the next Ki Memories groupie (following in my footsteps). He saw this layout and was like, “how, how did you do that? I love that!” And I have to say this is a nice added bonus of Tuesday sharing her name with a day of the week. So if you don’t use your tuesday sticker send it this way.
I rarely pull out my mini printer any more. I find it easier to print off a big stack at once and then roll around in the photos thinking about the stories I want to tell. But this page has been in my head since we were in Hawaii and Tuesday first noticed “happy” lights. I felt like I had to tell it now before I forgot that breathy sound she makes when she says happy. I hope I journaled it in a way that will bring back memories of her little voice in 20 years. Okay now I’m tearing up a bit!
This is mostly from a Studio Calico kit (yes I totally caved. Their design team is so amazing I was drooling over layouts for almost a year before I couldn’t take it any more!). I misted it with sparkly maya mist and the Mister Huey brand cream. Sarah and I both agree misting looks awesome… and scares us. So we both attempted it. We will not say how many mists we own vs. how much we used them. It might be a little embarrassing.
I kind of want to figure out how to do that thing were you put what you use with little links under my scrapbooking posts. What do you think, cool or annoying?
Well my supplies are still out so I might have to squeeze in one more page tonight. Of course Tuesday tricked us by going to bed at eight (after only 30 minutes of rocking!) only to wake up multiple times. We all need sleep little lady, get on the board the sleep train!!!
This and That
I’ve been busy like I think most of you are this time of year. I’m so enjoying family time, and Tuesday’s reaction to everything Christmas (the lights! the tree! the presents!). The days seem to be going by quicker (and the super short amount of daylight doesn’t help!). I was happy to see my studio looking like this yesterday:
Bathed in light! I took advantage of it and merged an idea I had earlier in the year, with one from the Yarn Harlot to come up with some stockpile kits from my own stash!
You might remember when I made myself a kit back in September and the mad scrapping that came out of it (that I realized today I still haven’t put away into albums, oops!).
Well I decided to put together some more to have to pull out through out the year. Stephanie (the Yarn Harlot) made herself a sock of the month club out of her stash of sock yarn and sock knitting patterns. She’s made up a pair every month and all she had to do was pull out the baggie of yarn + pattern and grab some needles. I love that idea.
I didn’t make up a dozen kits. But I did make four, plus one to dig into now (now being a relative term as I’m still merry making of course).
I tried to always include something older and something I especially love.
This bottom kit is the play with me now one I have sitting in a little tray on my desk. I have had this Klak tray from Ikea for years and it works great for pages/kits in progress.
I have realized a couple of things.
1. I have a lot of scrapbooking supplies.
2. I love them.
We have also re-arranged Tuesday’s room in preparation for her someday getting the railing off her crib and turing it into a bed.
I haven’t done a real nursery tour (at least I can’t remember doing one), because I didn’t actually get a bunch of matching stuff and decorate it like traditional nursery (lazy, plus the room was done being built about one week before Tuesday was born).
I ordered this giant beanbag for newborn photo shoots, but I’ll leave it uncovered in here when I’m not using it. Tuesday is loving this little nook (this is where the big reclining rocking chair was, we flip floped the furniture and put the bookcases in an L).
I finally put the branch drawer pulls on her dresser (that my grandfather made). I wanted to wait until it was painted white (along with the shelves for a more cohesive look), but who knows when I’ll get to that, and the other ones kept loosening up on me.
Where the giant chair is now. It takes up tons of space (has to be pulled forward so it can fully recline), and does not look as cool as those modern ones. You know what though? I would be a walking zombie with out this. Whose kid took three hours to get to sleep last night? Mine. Carmen asked me what I would do with my average two hours a night I spend rocking and cuddling Tuesday (Bj splits it with me most nights). I don’t know. Write the great American novel? Scrapbook my entire life in month? Miss cuddling Tuesday? Probably the latter. She is just so damn cute.
Expect more random check-ins until the first of the year when I have excitings things planned (very!).
In between crafting…
I’m watching funny things and going to Portland (my quilt guild meeting was last night). So this pretty much took the cake.
Enjoy.
A quick look back on the beach
I really don’t even want to look at the photos from our trip. It was so much fun, but so is December in general and I’m getting into the holiday spirit. This makes it hard for my brain to wrap around lovely warm Hawaii! I didn’t take my camera with me much, but here are a few shots, and some things I want to remember.
-It was sunny and warm and lovely… and that didn’t mean I got to hang out on the beach and relax! Ha! More like the opposite. Tuesday wanted to explore and dig and get wet. I wish I could have some how recorded her little laugh when I held her by both hands and dangled her feet in a wave. She loved to feel the pull of the water going back out and would have happily been carried away if I let her.
-Diaper free! I was all about what was best for Tuesday when deciding to do Elimination Communication and cloth diapering, but I’m not going to lie having her be reliably diaper free by this trip was a big goal. Last year half my suitcase was diapers! She’s 23 months and has been in undies full time since 18 months. She prefers a little potty seat reducer on the toilet but will go on any potty if she has to. Only a couple little night time misses, but no biggie with the waterproof pad I brought for her playpen.
-The last of her baby chub. Seeing her in swimsuits really brought home how skinny and tall she is getting. Much more little girl than baby. Though I still call her baby, so she calls all babies AND toddlers babies, including Chloe.
-Speaking of names she thought Carmen’s was “mommy” since she calls me “mama”. The four girls would go out together and Tutu would call for her mama and mommy to come over to her or look at this. Totally adorable!
-4.5 months as an age gap is quickly becoming a mute point. Chloe can keep up with Tuesday and then some! She’s about the same size (just a little shorter), and is full time on the potty too. It was great to see Tuesday with a playmate all the time. They were crazy funny together, running up and down the halls of the hotel. There was some hitting and fighting; which I’ve never had to deal with before and hope I handled well.
-The train! Or really any train! We could here this little steam train from our hotel. It goes so slow you could easily keep up by jogging next to it. Tuesday could have ridden all day long.
-She didn’t need to be entertained and there really wasn’t a whole lot to see on the short ride. I’d love to know what she was thinking. She did point out animals, cars, trees, and the water to me.
-We went on this together again later, a mama daughter date, to a little nearby town. We walked around and had lunch overlooking the ocean. I only had a tiny purse with me. I imagine it was the first of many similar adventure’s thrown together at a moments notice with my girl.
-If we weren’t talking about trains then we were talking about hula! We happened upon a free hula show at the shopping center by our hotel out walking one evening. She loved it and was seriously entranced. That sealed the deal and we decided to take her to a real luau. For three hours she sat and watched the dancers. She even wanted to be held by one after the show (and felt up her coconut covered breast, hilarious!). We bought her a little hula doll we call Teetee, and it’s big around here.
-A great trip with great friends. Probably the only downside was gaining five pound before Christmas so I like slightly pregnant… and I am not! But who can resist those Caramacs? Who?!?!?!
-I would also like to point out the whiteness of Tuesday and I… it IS possible to go to Hawaii and not get tan/burnt. We found some great coral friendly/free of all the yucky stuff sunscreen at our local health food store. People kept thinking it was our first day because we were so white, ha! Take that skin cancer!
Salem Oregon Beach Photographer
Ha! I wish! For those of you who don’t know this area the beach is an hour away… and you can rarely get away with wearing anything less than a fleece. Yes, we’re back from a lovely Hawaiian vacation. So sorry if you were on the flight back with us and our sick daughter who was that kid (you know, the screaming one). She’s getting over a cold, we’re getting up Christmas decorations (tree, check!) and getting back into work. I have a bunch of yummy warm and sunny pictures to work my way through but I had to edit the shoot I did with my friend’s family first so they would have then for Christmas gifts.
Chloe is 4.5 months younger than Tuesday, and 4.5 times faster I think.
But her mama can catch her!
Her dad was always close behind too.
The girls loved these little magnetic drawing board things. If you are going on a trip get one, they are lifesavers (I scored this one for four bucks at Fred Meyer)!
Gorgeous mama.
FYI this is Ka’anapali beach in Maui. It is awesome. I love their weather reports. They say things like, “chance of rain” only the chance there is so NOT the same thing as the chance (99% likely) of rain that our forecasters talk of in Oregon.
We had such a fabulous trip with this family. I went to high school with carmen. Right now on the bulletin board above me is a picture of the two of us pretending to be models in the sand on the Oregon beach… I think that needs to be a scrapbook page. Man how time flies!
Aloha
Enjoying vacation too much to blog… Plus chasing after Miss Wants To Dive Head First Into The Ocean is a lot of work. I’ve been very lax on taking photos (hence the iPhone shot), but I did do a family beach session this morning that I am excited to share. I’m not used to dealing with too much sun in December… It was a nice challenge to have. You can also look forward to a video of Tuesday, it will involve dancing. If I could read her mind I imagine it would be thinking something like, “I love Hawaii. I want to stay here forever and be a hula dancer. HAWAII!!!” I don’t have to guess the last part; she learned to say Hawaii and uses the word whenever she sees something here she likes… Which is everything (even sunscreen!). I like it all too and feel so lucky to be here.
